quote:So, um, shouldn't your dad be talking about the urgency of the petroleum issue?
Isn't that a little bit like the pro-abortion folks who say, "Shouldn't you be devoting your energy to helping children outside the womb?"
Not really. Not when people are using his essays (and others like it from others who claim "global warming is a myth") as ammunition for the "See, we don't need to worry about any of that silly environmentalism crap" camp.
Posts: 32919 | Registered: Mar 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
There's also the question of relative weighing. If someone spent 95% of their efforts on one thing and 5% on another, I think - if both parties regard the second as more important - it is legitmate to question why this is.
Posts: 10177 | Registered: Apr 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
I am fully willing to believe that Card is a staunch believer in the need to reduce reliance on petroleum on both a local and international level for reasons other than CO2 emission. I am also willing to believe that The next essay will speak eloquently on the subject.
That essay is not this essay. This essay has several pages that say those who support the notion of CO2 causing global warming are a pagan socialist cult of duplicitous liars who are so wrong-headed that they want to spread their lies to everyone’s children, and three paragraphs that say the pagan socialist cult of duplicitous liars want some of the right things, albeit mostly for the wrong reasons.
From a context-neutral point, the message I find I’d be most likely to take from the essay is not the necessity of petroleum conservation, but that the largest and best-known advocates of petroleum conservation and related issues are alarmists.
In a sound-bite world, to call someone an alarmist is to advocate ignoring them.
Posts: 3826 | Registered: May 2005
| IP: Logged |
quote:It is foolish optimism bordering on criminal neglect that we continue to think that our future will be all right as long as we find new ways to extract oil from proven reserves.
Instead of extracting it, we ought to be preserving it.
Congress ought to be giving incentives and then creating mandates that require hybrid vehicles to predominate within the next five years.
Within the next fifteen years, we must move beyond hybrids to means of transportation that don't burn oil at all.
Within thirty years, we must handle our transportation needs without burning anything at all.
I made the numbers up. Maybe where I said five years, it should be ten.
Then again, maybe where I said thirty years, we'll find ourselves wishing that somebody had insisted on fifteen.
Predicting the exact moment when our dependence on petroleum will destroy us is pointless.
What is certain is this: We will run out of oil that is cheap enough to burn. We don't know when, but we do know it will happen.
quote:There's also the question of relative weighing. If someone spent 95% of their efforts on one thing and 5% on another, I think - if both parties regard the second as more important - it is legitmate to question why this is.
posted
The basic assumption in game theory is that the value someone places on something can be inferred by how much resources they are willing to trade for it. Do you disagree with that assumption?
Posts: 10177 | Registered: Apr 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
Of course I do, assuming you're not tautologically defining "value someone places on something" as "thing they commit the most resources to."
But that's not really what I meant by "Why?"
Why do you need to comment and question on what OSC values and why is it legitimate that you do so? And "legitimate" must mean more here than it does in the sentence "It's legitimate to question and comment on everything," otherwise there would have been no need to defend the legitimacy of the questioning in the first place.
Posts: 26071 | Registered: Oct 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
I'm not sure I understand your question. I was responding to this:
quote:Isn't that a little bit like the pro-abortion folks who say, "Shouldn't you be devoting your energy to helping children outside the womb?"
by pointing out that the relative frequency of things changes the legitimacy of this question. I'm not sure what your why means in this context. Are you asking why I thought what I said was relevant? If so, I can explain.
Posts: 10177 | Registered: Apr 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
That assumption is not one of game theory, but of economics, and its for a narrow area of value: exchange value.
Many economists do assume that for most things which are routinely exchanged, exchange value closely approximates, for most people, "how much they value something" in a general sense, though that sense is not well-defined.
Also, even as a simple measure of exchange value you are misusing the idea. Exchange value is determined by how much someone would be willing to pay for a particular thing, not how much they do pay. In fact, exchange value is very rarely equal to what people pay, as paying more makes extremely little sense, and there are many factors that enable people to pay less.
The total exchange value of someone's consumption is the sum of the amounts they would be willing to pay for each marginal unit of the thing up to the amount they consume.
Lets talk about water. The amount someone would be willing to pay for the first marginal unit of water (say, the amount to keep one person alive for a year) is astronomical. The amount for the second, also fairly large. The amount for the two hundredth, not so much.
Very few people pay very much for the water they consume, but that doesn't mean they don't value it as I outline above.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
| IP: Logged |
Perhaps you could explain how it is printed on the first page of my game theory text book and has been a central part of the introduction to every game theory class I've ever taken then?
Yes, I used it simplisticly. That's all I needed for my purpose.
Posts: 10177 | Registered: Apr 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
You didn't just use it simplistically, you used it incorrectly. The amount someone spends on something is not a measure of the amount they would spend on something.
Its printed on the first page of your game theory text book because most people publishing in game theory are economists or were introduced to it through economics and because many famous results in game theory are also results in economics.
That is, there are many games (in the game theoretic sense) that use that assumption.
It is, however, perfectly possible to do game theory without that assumption. Furthermore, all games written with that assumption could be phrased as purely numeric games and obtain the same result, eliminating that assumption entirely. It is useful for framing, not necessary.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
I disagree with what you are saying. Also, I'm not sure what you are trying to accomplish here.
Posts: 10177 | Registered: Apr 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
Perhaps you could advance some reasons you are disagreeing?
The comment on it not being an assumption of game theory was a minor remark before getting into my main point. It is also the easiest to show I am wrong with; merely propose a game which I cannot eliminate that assumption from without undermining the game theoretic qualities of the game and you have done so.
My main point was to correct a flawed use of economic theory that proceeded as if value was equal to amount paid. When you stated the assumption you were correct; when you used it you were incorrect:
quote:If someone spent 95% of their efforts on one thing and 5% on another
That's a statement about amount paid, not amount one is willing to pay.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
| IP: Logged |
quote: Its printed on the first page of your game theory text book because most people publishing in game theory are economists or were introduced to it through economics and because many famous results in game theory are also results in economics.
I'm pretty sure some version of 'exchange theory' is used in all the social sciences.
Posts: 13123 | Registered: Feb 2002
| IP: Logged |
posted
SS: it was an observation grounded in being familiar with several major game theory textbooks (and their authors, in one case personally) and with game theory itself, not an assumption about exclusivity to economics
MrSquicky: you can even just name a game relying on that assumption or a paper containing such a game, I'm familiar with all of the classic examples and could look up anything else. It would take fewer characers than writing that you don't care.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
| IP: Logged |
posted
My point, above, was that Card is a big proponent of ending our dependency on gasoline, and simultaneously, is a big opponent of trusting the Global Warming model. He thinks that both are important issues, and writes essays on both. I happen to know that he has been planning another future essay that returns to the "let's end our car addiction" subject with great force. I'm sure that opponents of his position on that subject will think he is using his resources irresponsibly with that essay, and should have spent more time debunking Global Warming
In any case, to watch people react to this Global Warming essay as though its existence is so horrifying that it invalidates everything else he has ever said or will ever say on other subjects is annoying to me
"Why did Card spend his resources on this issue, instead of elsewhere, where he could do more good?"
Because his resources aren't parceled out the way you seem to assume. Each topic choice isn't a referendum on the urgency of every issue he could have addressed. The necessity of keeping up audience interest means that he must write on a different subject every week. Even if he considered Issue X to be THE most important issue in the world, after he wrote an essay on it, he would need to write essays of similar size and emphasis about completely different issues for several weeks before he could return to it. His choice and timing of subject is also affected by current events, by the publication of books that support or attack his position, and by the interests and conversations he's happened to have that week.
In other words, you're treating this essay like its existence is a definitive, quantifiable statement about the relative importance of this topic, compared to every other topic known to man. IE, because he wrote this essay, he must therefore not care enough about everything else.
I'm overstating the position for effect here, but even in its original form, it's still completely ridiculous.
Posts: 1539 | Registered: Jul 2004
| IP: Logged |
quote:Even if he considered Issue X to be THE most important issue in the world, after he wrote an essay on it, he would need to write essays of similar size and emphasis about completely different issues for several weeks before he could return to it.
I would argue that every Card essay for the last few years has been, in part or in total, on the pernicious influence of so-called intellectual elites. Is this a topic he feels compelled to revisit? Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
Still, I worry that if intellectual elites came out strongly in support of reducing our dependence on petroleum, your dad would take a second look at his position to figure out where he went wrong. *grin*
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
| IP: Logged |
posted
Oooh, and he is already familiar with what Jane Jacobs says about livable cities and how to make local microcommunities flourish (thus minimizing the need for long journeys on petro-fuel to get daily needs addressed).
Posts: 14017 | Registered: May 2000
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by Tarrsk: In every single one of those cases, with the exception of eugenics (which is perfectly feasible scientifically, but was abandoned because it is morally abhorrent), the people who disproved the established dogma were themselves scientists, publishing in peer reviewed literature. That fundamentally separates them from the folks trying to discredit the scientific consensus on climate change, who are doing no such thing. If you can name a single case where the scientific community remained obstinate in the face of overwhelming peer-reviewed evidence replicated by a number of independent investigators, then you might have a point.
Lyrhawn asked for a list of MAJOR scientific consensuses that were widely held to be fact and ended up being false, so I gave an answer. That was the point.
Next you have to prove that the scientific community that created them and the one that disproved them are the same thing.
Why? Because you're claiming that since 'scientists' were wrong back then, they are probably wrong today. Not that that proves anything by itself, but that still seems to be your argument. But if the scientific process, and the process of peer review and research aren't the same today as they were back then, then your point is moot.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
We might as well do the reverse while we're at it and show how since the skeptics were wrong 'back then', they're wrong now.
Posts: 13123 | Registered: Feb 2002
| IP: Logged |
posted
My argument is not that "scientists" are probably wrong (it would depend on what they were saying), but that there have been major scientific consensuses that have been abandoned in the past century. I was answering your question. Maybe you have me confused with someone else.
Of course peer review and research, like everything else in the world, always change, but this does not mean we can never draw lessons from history. If I wanted to refute the idea that since for example continental drift skeptics were wrong in the past, global warming skeptics are probably wrong today, I would just point out that it doesn't follow. Continental drift and global warming have nothing to do with each other;, and whether people believe something, is a really weak argument for whether something is true in science.
Posts: 544 | Registered: Mar 2007
| IP: Logged |
posted
Sorry, you're right. It was Resh who was making that argument. You answered the question and I mistakenly assumed it was you without going back to check my original question to see who I was asking it of.
I don't think this particular "lesson" means a whole lot though. I could cancel it out by pointing out astronomy was set back hundreds of years as a science by skeptics who had no idea what was going on, they just refused to believe what to them sounded like crazed impossibility. The lessesons in historical science for the naysayers being wrong and the scientists being wrong are both there.
But we're in a new era of science now. I think from a historical point of view, the comparisons aren't really all that valid.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
Surely the comparisons to the 1950's are valid?
I think we can learn a lot about what modern science is like by considering things over the past 100 years. Not the topic of this thread, though.
Posts: 544 | Registered: Mar 2007
| IP: Logged |
posted
I would say theories postulated from the 40's and 50's onward count. But I don't believe anyone has suggested such a claim that was made and disproved in this thread.
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
Whoops, I've neglected this thread for a while.
Reshpeckobiggle,
quote:Euripides: "The Science is in!"
Well, I'm convinced now. Because we all know how infallible and un-ideological scientists are.
Oh yeah, thanks for putting an exclamation mark where there was none. Because everyone should know that I'm hysterical and dogmatic.
quote:Did you read Card's article? If it didn't raise any doubts in you, then you really are hopeless.
Yes I have. And it has raised serious doubts about the way Mann's study was conducted, and any conclusions drawn from that study.
Yet I don't consider the vast body of evidence for anthropogenic global warming to be 'debunked,' despite the fact that the IPCC was enthralled by the visual appeal of that graph. OSC has argued that this is how all evidence for anthropogenic global warming is manufactured. I'm not going to take his word for it. There are bound to be a few rotten studies used to support a theory as profoundly important and widely discussed and debated as global warming.
And yes, I'm getting a copy of the books cited in the essay. Meanwhile you should follow The Rabbit's advice and pay your nearest university library a visit.
quote:I mean, I can see taking evolutionary theory on faith.
I don't, and why would that be any different?
quote:But for global warming being caused by humans, "the science is in"...
Yeah, you should go read some of it.
Jhai,
quote:Very rough analogy: suppose you know that there is some sort of wild animal in a room of your house, and you're pretty certain it's destroying stuff and generally making a mess. Once you realize that the animal is in there, you could charge right in & try to kick it out. However, you may be faced with a small squirrel, a rabid raccoon, an angry mother bear, or some other sort of animal. That's where the uncertainty comes in. In this case, it might be better to wait a while, gather more information, develop/gather tools (like a dart gun), before you go charging in. This might be true despite the fact that, the longer you wait, the more damaged the room becomes. Sure, you might be able to get the animal out without waiting, but you could come out of the fight pretty banged up.
As Paul said, we don't know exactly what will happen if CO2 levels are reduced, but the damage greenhouse gases are doing now and will continue to do if unchecked, will be catastrophic. The unanticipated side effects of reducing CO2 to the levels it was at before we started polluting the earth en masse are highly unlikely to be as damaging. I'm all for studying the possibilities and using sound data to form projections. Yet in daily life and deciding policy, we have to gauge our choices based on levels of probability and magnitude.
Another rough analogy: Suppose you have discovered fire for the first time. You hold your hand in the flame, and it begins to burn. You want to take your hand out of the flame, but you've never been burned before and don't know what cool air will do to the wound. So you wait.
Posts: 1762 | Registered: Apr 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
I have discovered recently that my participation on this forum (as well as a few others) and generally in all the friendly debates I find myself most likely to be engaged in have me taking the angle most diametrically opposite the one exhibiting the most flagrant displays of arrogance and notions of superiority and enlightenment. So I'm learning some things about myself here, and I thank you all for that. I think my entire contribution to any future threads here will basically be along the lines of a suggestion to "get over yourself."
P.S. Super busy recently; all but unable to drop in anymore. I'll participate a bit more in the near soon.
Posts: 1286 | Registered: Dec 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
Resh, if you're not going to engage with the substance of your opponents' posts or can't at this time, at least refrain from making a sarcastic ad hominem attack.
Posts: 1762 | Registered: Apr 2006
| IP: Logged |
posted
I think accusing people here of arrogance and "notions of superiority and enlightenment" certainly counts as an ad hominem attack.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
| IP: Logged |
This is a report on Gore's recent proposals to Congress. The first part of item 1, a freeze on CO2 emissions, would be both easy and not needed. US CO2 emissions are flat in this decade (declining per capita) and the same is true for the European countries I checked. http://cdiac.ornl.gov/trends/emis/tre_coun.htm
[ March 21, 2007, 04:24 PM: Message edited by: Qaz ]
Posts: 544 | Registered: Mar 2007
| IP: Logged |
posted
Is it required that you accuse a specific individual, when instead you've accused everyone disagreeing with you?
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
| IP: Logged |
quote:Originally posted by Paul Goldner: When the scientific consensus has been wrong, it has NOT been the media or non-scientific political movements that have been right.
I'd like to emphasize this good point. When science is "wrong", in most of the cases that have been pointed out, it was science that ended up developing the correct theory, not the popular opinion, the media, religion, or business interests. Credit must be given to the correct parties. To add insult to injury, in some cases, science was "wrong" only because it was used to rationalise previously held beliefs from non-scientific movements. Ex, eugenics was just religious and racial prejudice wrapped up in a new-fangled "science" sugar coating.
Perhaps it would be interesting to look at the motives for the people driving this debate. If there was proof against global warming, you can bet that the scientist who disproved it would become a big name in both the scientific and world communities, another Galileo or Venter. A scientist who contributes yet another paper to the existing thousands is nameless. Meanwhile, the people disputing it either have competing interests (businesses, voters, who would be damaged by having to do anything about global warming) or simply have religious beliefs leading to an axe to grind against science.
Why take the word of a group that is biased against that of a group that in essence contains built-in checks and balances?
Posts: 7593 | Registered: Sep 2006
| IP: Logged |
quote:Meanwhile, the people disputing it either have competing interests (businesses, voters, who would be damaged by having to do anything about global warming) or simply have religious beliefs leading to an axe to grind against science.
The people promoting global warming fears also have competing interests such as continuation of grants, new carbon offset companies, flourenscent lightbulb manufacturers, solar panel companies, alternative envergy companies. How many scientists are being paid to continue to prove Global Warming? There are billions of dollars on both sides of the issue
Posts: 1918 | Registered: Mar 2005
| IP: Logged |
posted
Which is only one of the reasons that the argument isn't sound. We often use "ad hominem" to mean "insult," but it just means addressing the person rather than the argument. We shouldn't take the word of the biased group against the one with the checks and balances (I'm not sure which one Al Gore fits into and which one his opponents fit into, but it doesn't matter), but we should instead take nobody's word for it and look at the arguments instead.
Posts: 544 | Registered: Mar 2007
| IP: Logged |
posted
Which is why it wasn't an ad hominem. I said that I find myself "taking the angle most diametrically opposite the one exhibiting the most flagrant displays of arrogance and notions of superiority and enlightenment." If you, Tom, can point to where I called any person or group of persons arrogant, I'll concede the point. But I do believe I was saying the argument is displaying "arrogance and notions of superiority and enlightenment," and this is generally what I oppose about so-called liberal ideology.
posted
Mucas, you post is full of unfounded statements. Eugenics was not particularly religious, if I'm not mistaken. It was developed from Darwinistic theory and was generally embraced by atheists like... Hitler, for instance. After all, Evolution allows you to be an intellectually fulfilled atheist.
As for the evolution of science in contrast with religion, science has been wholly mutable for all it's existence, and yet most religions have maintained their core tenets since their inception and still have practical uses today. If you wish to apply scientific standards to religion, you've got something there, but if you look at actual evidence of history, it's evident that religion/philosophy as been the single most effective force in the progress of civilization. That should speak for itself, but of course religion must be destroyed at all costs, even if it means abandoning the truth.
Finally, there is no reason anyone should try to disprove global warming. The fishy thing about the whole thing, the part that seems to be driven by some agenda and requires subversion and oftentimes [edit]intimidation in order to maintain its place as "science," is the anthropogenic causation theory. And that is where the "science" starts looking more like "Islam."
posted
*Trying not to laugh at above statement* [edit] Goldner's post, I mean.
Hitler used Christianity as a tool. To quote Joseph Goebbels: ""The Führer is deeply religious, but deeply anti-Christian. He regards Christianity as a symptom of decay."
At any rate, I retract my statement about Hitler being an atheist. Whatever he believed, I think it would be a stretch to call him a Christian.
posted
I really don't. The worship he engaged in during his life was entirely christian worship. His church membership was of the christian variety. And the church accepted him as a member. And he claimed to be a christian.
If you want to argue that his behavior was not the behavior a christian should exhibit, then fine. But, thats never been the criteria for being a christian unless people want to disown their co-religionists.
Posts: 4112 | Registered: May 2001
| IP: Logged |
quote:Mucas, you post is full of unfounded statements.
If it's so full of them, provide another example. Eugenics is at best a grey area, especially in its initial application by US immigration. Hitler's application of genetics is a worse example for your case; it wasn't scientific at all. The science was layered on top of the old language of ethnic cleansing.
quote:It was developed from Darwinistic theory and was generally embraced by atheists like... Hitler, for instance.
Many of the religious have manufactured other excuses for ethnic cleansing. Also, atheism is not a moral philosophy. An atheist is simply a person who does not believe in gods and the supernatural. Hitler wasn't a monster because he was an atheist. He was a monster because of his violent and cruel political and pseudo-spiritual ideology.
quote:As for the evolution of science in contrast with religion, science has been wholly mutable for all it's existence, and yet most religions have maintained their core tenets since their inception and still have practical uses today.
The core principle of science is the scientific method. That has not changed since the method was fomalised, though scientists had been using the method intuitively for centuries beforehand.
The fact that scientific knowledge is constantly adjusting in light of new evidence is its primary virtue. We learn more and more every day.
Religion on the other hand is not amenable to change when new evidence is brought up, except by reinterpreting the religion to accommodate the evidence, or ignoring the conflict. Remember Galileo? The fact that religion is stubborn makes it less credible, actually.
What has remained constant with science is the methodology of gathering new information.
I'll have to quote KoM here; it's elementary logic.
quote:If you wish to apply scientific standards to religion, you've got something there, but if you look at actual evidence of history, it's evident that religion/philosophy as been the single most effective force in the progress of civilization.
That depends entirely on what you define as progress. If you mean moral progress (and its not entirely clear we're making progress in that direction), then take religion out of the equation. The change of moral sensibilities to what it is today are the result mainly of moral philosophy and evolutionary psychology outside of religion (which you claim has unchanging tenets, anyway). This was recently discussed in this thread.
quote:Finally, there is no reason anyone should try to disprove global warming.
I'd agree, if everyone looked at the long-term consequences of their actions. But many oil companies and industrialists would disagree, and much of the current establishment seems convinced that going green would cost them or the country too much. Which is not true.
quote:And that is where the "science" starts looking more like "Islam."
quote:Originally posted by DarkKnight: ... competing interests such as continuation of grants, new carbon offset companies, flourenscent lightbulb manufacturers, solar panel companies, alternative envergy companies. How many scientists are being paid to continue to prove Global Warming? ...
At the risk of being vulgar, *Show me the money.* You show me the amounts of money that the kinds of companies you listed contributed to scientists. I'll show you the amounts of money that businesses that oppose action have contributed to scientists. I'm fully prepared to be surprised.
Let's start with an initial pot of $10,000 per scientist and 16 million from Exxon to various lobbyist organizations formed of "scientific spokespeople", for a start. Let's see how high we can go.
quote: Originally posted by Resh: Finally, there is no reason anyone should try to disprove global warming...
I thought I already covered that with my reference to Ventor. However, if you need the background... Back during the days of the Human Genome Project, millions of dollars of public money was being thrown into the project using a technique known as shotgun sequencing. The project was slated to go on for many years. Ventor disagreed that it would tak so long and said he had a method for doing whole genome shotgun sequencing. Many scientists were skeptical, so he started his own company and just *did it*. Now he has money, fame, and a big name.
You can be sure that if a scientist could disprove global warming he would just *do it* because disproving a scientific consensus gives you a lot more fame than just riding the bandwagon.
How many people remember Einstein for revolutionalising Newtonian physics? How many people remember John Smith from Cottington who published a paper agreeing with Newton?
Posts: 7593 | Registered: Sep 2006
| IP: Logged |
Most of the things you listed there "flourenscent lightbulb manufacturers, solar panel companies, alternative envergy companies," are going to make money regardless of whether or not global warming is a reality. Why? Because they are efficient, and they save people money. They could be sold on that alone, and don't need a climate change scientist to prove the point.
Should we stop believing in anti-biotics research? After all, isn't it all just a giant scheme to make billions for the big pharmas? We keep hearing all this naysaying from scientists about how these big diseases are coming and all this genetic mutation crap, but hey, I feel fine. I won't let those money hungry scientists tell me how to live my life!
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
| IP: Logged |
Printer-friendly view of this topic
![[Smile]](smile.gif)
![[Wink]](wink.gif)
